Stand Your Ground

Turn on cable news or browse the Internet and you are likely to get a detailed account on the latest developments from the George Zimmerman murder trial.  As most people are aware, George Zimmerman is charged with the second-degree murder of Trayvon Martin and pleaded not guilty based on self-defense.  Much of the controversy surrounding the case is related to the "stand your ground" law in Florida, which allowed Mr. Zimmerman to initially be released by police on the night of the shooting.  The relentless stream of news coverage surrounding the murder trial has meant that the term stand-your-ground is presented to millions watching the coverage, yet I wondered how many actually understood what the term means.  Regardless of why you are interested in the trial, understanding the details of the law, as applied in the current context, can significantly assist in a more comprehensive understanding of what is going on in the courtroom.

Stand-your-ground:  Florida is among the sixteen states that currently have specific stand-your-ground statutes on the books.  The others states with similar laws are Alabama, Arizona, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Utah. 

So what is stand-your-ground?  Before you can understand what Florida's stand-your-ground law means, we must first look at the broader legal concept of self-defense and the legal theory of duty to retreat.  Duty to retreat is a legal doctrine incorporated in some degree by a majority of states and generally means that a person who is under imminent threat of personal harm must retreat from the harm as much as possible before responding with force in self-defense.  Essentially state laws want a person who is under imminent threat to retreat or attempt to retreat from the source of harm as much as possible before resorting to force.  What about if I'm in my own home?  The duty to retreat doctrine only applies when you are outside of your home.  The idea being if you are outside of your home and come under an imminent threat, attempting to retreat from harm can avoid an incident where deadly force is needed.

Stand-your-ground laws basically void the duty to retreat doctrine and generally state that an individual can use force to defend themselves without first attempting to retreat from the danger.  This leads to a complicated scenario because the burden of proof for someone to use deadly force under stand-your-ground simply requires that person to believe or imagine themselves to be in danger.  Chapter 776.013(3) of Florida law states:

A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.      

As you can see from the wording of Florida's law, the only requirement for an individual to use deadly force is if the person "reasonably believes" the deadly force to be necessary.  While every person has a right to feel safe within their community and outside their home, in legally permissible places, the ambiguous nature of the law leaves room for varying degrees of interpretation.  Hopefully this helps you understand the nature of all "stand your ground" laws.